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Massacre of Polish people to be remembered in Bradford

Members of Bradford’s Polish community will lay a wreath in commemoration of the 74th anniversary of the Katyn Massacres, carried out on Polish nationals in the Secong World War.

The wreath-laying will take place by the Katyn memorial outside the Polish Church on Edmund Street in Bradford on Sunday at 11am.

The ceremony will mark the anniversary of the Katyn Massacres, carried out by the Soviet Secret Police in spring 1940 on the order of Joseph Stalin.

The execution, in the Katyn Forest in Russia, was of an estimated 22,000 Polish prisoners of war.

Polish Veterans Association president Romana Pizon said: “This crime was hidden until the government of Nazi Germany announced the discovery of mass graves in the Katyn Forest in 1943.

“When the London-based Polish government-in-exile asked for an investigation by the International Red Cross, Stalin immediately severed diplomatic relations with it.

“The Soviet Union claimed the victims had been murdered by the Nazis, and continued to deny responsibility for the massacres until 1990, when it officially acknowledged and condemned the perpetration of the killings.”